That Word I Can't Say
by harukafics
Summary: Summary This is an excerpt from my RPG in which the characters can 'vent' about anything that comes to mind, good or bad, and get feedback from each other. Not necessarily canon.


Note: This is an excerpt from my old RPG in which the characters could 'vent' about anything that comes to mind, good or bad, and get feedback from each other. Not necessarily canon.

"That Word I Can't Say …." (Prince of Tennis)

By Haruka (haruka at ymail dot com)

* * *

Today we had a training session which involved a favorite exercise of Inui-senpai's for our hand-eye co-ordination. He made coloured pylons (red, blue, and yellow) and coloured the curved white line on tennis balls to correspond to those.

The idea of the exercise was that when the balls came at us, we were supposed to hit them back so that the red-striped ball would hit the red pylon. So the exercise was two-fold - it was practice for quick-recognition of the stripe colour and for accuracy in hitting the ball against the correct pylon.

Our inspiration for NOT making any errors was the penalty of having to drink Inui-senpai's special veggie juice. A more vile liquid has never been known to man before, trust me. No one knows what's in it, and we're probably better off not knowing. All we _do_ know is that we're always sick after we drink it (he assures us that it's healthy stuff, but I tell you, we sure don't FEEL healthy after a full glass of it.)

Anyway, we've had the veggie juice before, so we all tried very, very hard not to make any errors during the practice. Only Fuji-senpai wasn't scared - he's the only human being who can drink the juice and keep smiling, it's bizarre. I was extremely relieved not to make any errors during my turn.

When it was Eiji-senpai's turn, though, something unexpected happened. He had already made a few successful shots when a familiar voice from outside the fence called out, "Kikumaru-san swings like a rusty gate!"

Eiji-senpai looked in that direction and missed his next shot. He was horrified, both to miss the shot, and to see his rival from Hyoutei Gakuen watching him and smirking (Gakuto Mukahi is almost _always_ smirking.)

There was a time when Eiji-senpai and Momo-senpai played Doubles against Hyoutei's Gakuto Mukahi and Yuushi Oshitari (Oishi-senpai was hurt and couldn't play Doubles with Eiji-senpai like usual.) Gakuto and Eiji quickly became rivals because they're both acrobatic players (Gakuto has an amazing move called 'Moon Salute' in which he returns the ball in mid-air while performing a high flip.) In terms of acrobatics, he's better than Eiji-senpai, but he still ended up losing because Eiji-senpai had better endurance.

Gakuto is small (only a couple of inches taller than me, despite being two years older) and I guess he's okay-looking, in a girly sort of way. He has kind of burgundy hair in a pageboy style with the bangs cut in 'V' between his eyebrows. There's a word for Gakuto, but my Kaa-san (Mother) would wash my mouth out with soap if I said it out loud. However, it's safe to write it here - B.I.T.C.H. (Yes, he is the world's first official boy-bitch. Truly. And considering what I've heard some of the older boys say he _really_ does with his Doubles partner, I think he might be an S.L.U.T., too.)

Gakuto loved that he'd made Eiji-senpai miss his shot, and was even more delighted when he saw the look on Eiji-senpai's face when he was handed a glass of the horrible veggie juice. Eiji-senpai looked pleadingly at Inui-senpai, "But he distracted me!" he reasoned. "Distractions are a part of tennis, you have to learn to ignore them," Inui-senpai said truthfully.

So Eiji-senpai had to drink the whole glass of juice with his worst enemy looking on with interest. He tried - oh boy, did he try - not to look repulsed and to stay in control, but a few seconds after he drained the glass, he couldn't help himself and ran for the bathroom (which is pretty much where we all end up after drinking that stuff.)

Gakuto laughed his butt off which I didn't like. But I don't get mad, I play tennis. I headed toward the fence (he didn't notice, he was too busy making nasty remarks about Eiji-senpai's lack of 'endurance') and then I tossed a ball, took a running jump and flipped in the air, hitting the ball over the fence in a perfect copy of Gakuto's own 'Moon Salute' (have I mentioned I can copy anyone's tennis move after seeing it once?) The ball bounced off his thick skull and shut him up long enough to blink in surprise, then he gave me the _nastiest_ look and started screaming threats at me.

Mada mada dane.

Our Coach, Sumire-sensei, intervened and after making sure Gakuto wasn't hurt, she asked that he leave our campus. THEN she pinched my cheek hard (OW!) and scolded me for deliberately trying to injure another player. I'm not so sure it counts if you do it when you're not actually playing the person AND they're trespassing on your campus and scouting out your team, but I could tell that argument wouldn't help my case.

As further punishment, Inui-senpai made me drink that disgusting juice (my stomach still hurts ...) and I was benched for the remainder of practice. When Eiji-senpai found out, he gave me a big hug in the locker room and said how much he loved his Ochibi-chan and that he only wished he'd been there to see Gakuto get bonked. I didn't say so, but that made the pinching and juice worth it (not so sure about the benching, though.)

Ryoma

* * *

(2005)

Prince of Tennis belongs to Konomi Takeshi.

This fic is not to be re-posted.


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